2013 Barcoding Changes You Need on Your Radar

Many direct mail companies like Heritage have been using POSTNET barcodes on their mailings. In January 2009, the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) introduced another kind of barcode: an Intelligent Mail (IM) barcode.

There are 2 choices of IM barcodes to use to qualify for automation discounts:

Beginning in January 2013, the USPS stopped using POSTNET barcodes altogether and now only allows basic and full-service IM barcodes for automation price eligibility.
So what does that mean for YOUR business?

You’ll now need to use an Intelligent Mail (IM) barcode on your outgoing mail.

Using the full-service IM barcodes provides a better discount than using the basic IM barcodes. What’s more:

Full-service IM barcode adoption will be REQUIRED
for automation discountsbeginning in January 2014.

The USPS states that this move to full-service IM barcodes will have the following benefit:

“Customers will know in real time where their mail or packages are in the postal network and precisely when they are delivered.”

Heritage Printing was pre-approved by the USPS for both basic and full-service Intelligent Mail service levels. We’ve already begun to use IM barcodes on all our outgoing mail jobs using our mailer ID.

You can trust that our specialists here at Heritage will keep you informed of important happenings like this transition from POSTNET to Intelligent Mail barcodes.

If you have any questions on the latest changes in barcoding requirements, please feel free to email or call 262-790-5000.